This succinct, tightly-written book offers a critical examination of the key issues facing policing in modern Britain. Those issues can be summarised in the following way: how is the apparently insatiable demand by the public for more policing and better protection to be satisfied, given the continued limits on public spending; that there is concern that what the public demands may not have a significant effect on crime levels; and that further extension of police powers and the reach of the law could themselves have unwanted consequences. All these questions are posed and answered on the basis of the wealth of research and operational evidence gathered by the police service itself, the Home Office, and independent researchers.

The book is comprehensive in its examination of all the issues outlined above, but it is jargon-free and accessible, thus ensuring its appeal to the well-informed lay person as well as to students of criminology, criminal justice, social policy and those enrolled in police studies courses, and policy-makers.